PDA Sim a web-based management simulation game

["Michael Bean"]

Forio Business Simulations has just released a system dynamics simulation game,
called PDA Sim, that focuses on managing a handheld computer company.

We would appreciate any insights from our colleagues in the SD community on the
simulation. You can try the simulation at:
http://www.forio.com/pdasim

We have three learning objectives for PDA Sim:

- Learn how to manage a portfolio of products across multiple product lifecycles.

- Learn how to use financial data to make pricing and product line decisions.

- Experience how decisions can have consequences many years into the future.

Our design objectives for this simulation were:

Accessibility: we wanted the simulation to be appealing to someone who is browsing
the Internet. Users will likely have a low level of commitment to playing the
simulation, at least initially. Therefore, two design principles we attempted to
follow were a) fast loading time and b) self-explanatory user interface and story
line.

We avoided delivery mechanisms (like Flash and client-side Java) that require the
initial long download times but can have elaborate graphics and instead primarily
used server-side delivery that with limited animated graphics but loads faster. Our
goal was for the simulation to load in less than 10 seconds on a Netscape or IE 4.0
browsers running on a dial-up modem (10 seconds still a long time to wait, but
acceptable, we hope).

Our initial usability testing indicated that the traditional Microworlds-style
interface (with reports, graphs, and decisions), so familar to most of the
subscribers of this list, was confusing to individuals casually browsing a website.
Interestingly, most of our first users clicked the "submit decisions" button only
once and thought the simulation was over. Without help, they didnt understand that
the simulation was iterative. We redesigned the summary screen to make it obvious
that the player is supposed to see how results have changed in subsequent rounds.

Asynchronous usage: we wanted the simulation to be engaging and competitive without
other players using the simulation at exactly the same time. Therefore weve added
high score lists and a strategy description page so its possible to realize there
are others out there playing the simulation with you. You can see our attempt at this
at: http://www.forio.com/pdasim
esults_all.jsp

Regards, Michael
Michael Bean
Forio Business Simulations
mbean@forio.com